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0 pointsethbr19mo ago0 comments

At the end of the day, it's the average productivity across a population that matters.

So GPS makes people worse at orienteering -- on average, does it get everyone where they need to go, better / faster / easier?

Sometimes, the answer is admittedly no. Google + Facebook + TikTok certainly made us less informed when they cannibalized reporting (news media origination) without creating a replacement.

But on average, I'd say calculators did make the population more mathematically productive.

After all, lots of people sucked at math before them too.

0 comments

palata9mo ago

> After all, lots of people sucked at math before them too.

A calculator doesn't do maths, it does arithmetic. People sucked at maths, but I'm pretty sure they were better with arithmetic.

> At the end of the day, it's the average productivity across a population that matters.

You're pushing my example. My point is that AI may actually make the average developer worse. Sure, also more productive. So it will reinforce this trend that has been in the software industry for more than a decade: produce more but worse software.

Productivity explains why we do it. It doesn't mean it is desirable.

ethbr1OP9mo ago

You're looking at this from a human-centric perspective.

I'm suggesting you consider it from an objective perspective.

It's easily possible for an organization to be more productive with worse developers because of the tools they have access to.

And no, that's not some slight of verbal hand in measuring "productive" -- they are able to ship more value, faster.

fzeroracer9mo ago

> And no, that's not some slight of verbal hand in measuring "productive" -- they are able to ship more value, faster.

Ship more value faster is exactly a verbal slight of hand. That's the statement used by every bad product manager and finance asshole to advocate for shipping out broken code faster. It's more value because more code is more content, but without some form of quality guard rails you run into situations where everything breaks. I've been on teams just like that where suddenly everything collapses and people get mad.

1 more reply

palata9mo ago

> I'm suggesting you consider it from an objective perspective.

What is objective? That profitability is good? We're destroying our environment to the point where many of us will die from it for the sake of profitability. We're over-using limited natural resources for the sake of profitability. In my book that's not desirable at all.

Companies are profit-maximising machines. The path to more profitability tends to be enshittification: the company makes more money by making it worse for everybody. AI most definitely requires more resources and it seems like those resources will be used to do more, but of lower quality.

Surely that's profitable. But I don't think it is desirable.

1 more reply

monkeyelite9mo ago

> it's the average productivity across a population that matters.

That’s not clear to me at all.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

0 pointsethbr19mo ago0 comments

At the end of the day, it's the average productivity across a population that matters.

So GPS makes people worse at orienteering -- on average, does it get everyone where they need to go, better / faster / easier?

Sometimes, the answer is admittedly no. Google + Facebook + TikTok certainly made us less informed when they cannibalized reporting (news media origination) without creating a replacement.

But on average, I'd say calculators did make the population more mathematically productive.

After all, lots of people sucked at math before them too.

0 comments

palata9mo ago

> After all, lots of people sucked at math before them too.

A calculator doesn't do maths, it does arithmetic. People sucked at maths, but I'm pretty sure they were better with arithmetic.

> At the end of the day, it's the average productivity across a population that matters.

Productivity explains why we do it. It doesn't mean it is desirable.

ethbr1OP9mo ago

You're looking at this from a human-centric perspective.

I'm suggesting you consider it from an objective perspective.

It's easily possible for an organization to be more productive with worse developers because of the tools they have access to.

And no, that's not some slight of verbal hand in measuring "productive" -- they are able to ship more value, faster.

fzeroracer9mo ago

> And no, that's not some slight of verbal hand in measuring "productive" -- they are able to ship more value, faster.

1 more reply

palata9mo ago

> I'm suggesting you consider it from an objective perspective.

Surely that's profitable. But I don't think it is desirable.

1 more reply

monkeyelite9mo ago

> it's the average productivity across a population that matters.

That’s not clear to me at all.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse